LER 590/SOC 596
Comparative Employment Relations
Spring 2017
Monday 8 - 10:50 AM
Professor: Eunmi Mun
Office: LER 233/Lincoln Hall 3098
Email:
Office hours: by appointment
This course examines employment systems in selected developed, newly industrialized, and developing economies. We will discuss how distinctive labor market institutionsemerged in the context of economic development and evolved through interactions with the global economy. Topics include management-labor relations, and the roles of firms, national governments, and international organizations in shaping employment systems. Emphasis will be placed on the analytical tools needed to make multi-country comparisons, to link theory and practice, and to understand the reasons for major changes in the nature of employment relations. Open to Ph.D. students in Sociology and MHRIR students at LER. 3 professional hours; 4 grad hours.
GOALS OF THE COURSE
- To discuss diverse theoretical perspectives that help us analyze how institutional arrangements are different across countries and why such differences emerge
- To problematize the underlying assumption that there is a shared path of capitalist development of employment relations
- To analyze the effects of globalization on local employment relations
- To develop collaboration, writing, critical reading, analysis, presentation, and research skills
Course Policies and Requiremets
Readings
All readings listed in this syllabus(except for the chapters from the textbook)are available online. I may also post additional materials during the semester when there are new developments of interest to relevant topics.It is your responsibility to check course Moodle website regularly.I also encourage students to suggest items that may be of interest to the class.
Students are expected to do the listed reading in the course schedule for every class and come prepared to discuss it. Readings marked with an asterisk (*) are supplementary—students are not required but encouraged to read them.
Textbook:
Greg J. Bamber, Russell D. Lansbury, Nick Wailes, and Chris F. Wright. 2014.International & Comparative Employment Relations (6th edition). Sage publications.
Class attendance and participation
Class attendance is mandatory, and missing two classes will cause a decrease of one-letter grade. Excused absence will be considered only when students give the professor a notice in advance. Also, partially missed days may result in a lower participation score.
The course is designed to be interactive. Thus, the success of this course depends on active participation of students; that is, you will learn the most by actively participating in class discussion. I will incorporate discussions during the lectures and organize student-led discussions throughout the semester.
Use of computers, recording devices, phones, and other electronics, is prohibited during class time. This is a discussion-heavy course. Electronic devices that may distract students from focusing on class discussion should be turned off at all times.(Please talk to me if you need an exception to this rule.)
Weekly discussion questions
In order to encourage student participation, I ask students to prepare for 1-3 discussion questions based on the readings. During the class time, each student will explain their questions and lead discussion.
In-class presentation on current issues
On the first day of class, I will circulate a sign-up sheet for students to pick a day when they want to make a short presentation on current employment/corporate governance issues of the country discussed in the readings. Students will need to prepare for a short presentation, discussion questions, and lead discussion in class. (Students who will make a presentation do not need to prepare for discussion questions about the readings.)
Mid-term essay (maximum 5 pages)
I will posta prompt for the mid-term essay.
Finalproject
This assignment is to give an opportunity for students to apply what they learned in class to an empirical setting of their interest. I will as students to pick a country they want to better understand, which is not discussed in class, and write a report on employment relations of the country. To assist their independent research, I will distribute a project guideline after I return the mid-term essays.Also, I will set aside time for one-on-one consultation in the final week.
Presentation: Each student will have 15 minutes to present materials. In the presentation, students are expected to provide background and context for the case, including current cultural, political, economic, and other information that help describe the core characteristics of employment relations of the country of their choosing.
Final paper (5-10 pages): Students can choose between 1) a summary report of their research and 2) a research proposal developed from their final project.
Grades and Assignments Dues
Late work will be penalized one-letter grade per day until the graded assignment has been handed back to the class; at that point, late work will not be accepted.
Participation / 20%Discussion questions / Every class / 10%
In-class presentation on current issues / 10%
Mid-term essay / March 17, 5PM / 20%
Final project presentation / May 1 / 20%
Final paper / May 5 / 20%
COURSE SCHEDULE
Week 1 (January 23) Is the world flat?
Dani Rodrik. 2011. The Globalization Paradox. Chapters 1 and 2.
Week 2 (January 30)Cross-national institutional differences
Chapter 1: Introduction in ICER.
Peter Hall and David Soskice. 2000. “An Introduction to Varieties of Capitalism,” in Varieties of Capitalism. Introduction (pp. 1-68).
*Supplementary readings:
Frank Dobbin. 1994. Forging Industrial Policies. Chapters 1.
Week 3 (February 6)“Employment at will” in the US
Chapter 3 in ICER.
Peter Cappelli. 1999.The New Deal at Work: Managing the Market-Driven Workplace. (Boston: Harvard Business School Press. pp. 18-37.
Arne Kalleberg. 2009. “Precarious Work, Insecure Workers: Employment Relations in Transition.” American Sociological Review 74:1-22.
Week 4 (February 13) US corporate governance
MiltonFriedman. “The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits.” The New York Times Magazine, September 13, 1970.
Gerald F. Davis. 2009. “Financial Markets and Corporate Governance,” in Managed by the Markets: How Finance Reshaped America. New York: Oxford University Press. Pp. 31-58.
Mary O’Sullivan. 2009. “What Opportunity is Knocking? Regulating Corporate Governance in the United States,” In Government and Markets: Towards a New Theory of Regulation. Chapter 10.
Week 5 (February 20)Lifetime employment in Japan
Chapter 10 in ICER.
Chiaki Moriguchi and Hiroshi Ono. 2006. “Japanese Lifetime Employment: A Century’s Perspective.” in Institutional Change in Japan. London: Routledge. Pp.152-76.
Sanford Jacoby. 2005. Embedded Corporations: Corporate Governance and Employment Relations in Japan and the United States. Chapters2-3. Pp. 21-77. (parts)
*Supplementary reading:
Gilson, Ronald J. and Mark J. Roe. 1999. "Lifetime Employment: Labor Peace and the Evolution of Japanese Corporate Governance." Columbia Law Review 99:508-540.
Week 6 (February 27)The Japanese model as a non-liberal capitalism
Masahiro Aoki. 1990. “Toward an Economic Model of the Japanese Firm.” Journal of Economic Literature 1990(March):1-27.
Richard Pascale and Thomas P. Rohlen. 1983. "The Mazda Turnaround." Journal of Japanese Studies 9:219-63. (parts)
Robert Wade. 1996. “Japan, the World Bank, and the art of paradigm maintenance: The East Asian Miracle in Political Perspective,” New Left Review June 1996 Pp. 3-36.
*Supplementary reading:
Abe, Masahiro. 2002. "Corporate Governance Structure and Employment Adjustment in Japan: An Empirical Analysis Using Corporate Finance Data." Industrial Relations 41(4):683-702.
Week 7 (March 6)Co-determination in Germany
Chapter 8 in ICER.
Joel Rogers and Wolfgang Streeck. 1994. “Workplace Representation Overseas:The Works Councils Story,”in Working Under Different Rules, ed. by Richard Freeman, New York:Russell Sage Foundation.
Neil Fligstein. 2000. “The Logic of Employment Systems,” in The Architecture of Markets: An Economic Sociology of Twenty-First-Century Capitalist Societies. Chapter 5. Pp. 101-122.
Week 8 (March 13)The stakeholder-oriented model of corporate governance
Gregory Jackson. 2005. “Stakeholders Under Pressure: Corporate Governance Reform and Labour Management in Germany and Japan.”Corporate Governance: An International Review 13(3):419-428.
Sanford M.Jacoby. 2007. “Principles and Agents: CalPERS and corporate governance in Japan.”Corporate Governance 15:5-15.
Luca Enriques and Paolo Volpin. 2007. “Corporate Governance Reforms in Continental Europe,” Journal of Economic Perspectives.21:117-40.
*Supplementary reading:
Ronald Dore. 2007. “Insider Management and Board Reform: For Whose Benefit?” in Aoki, Masahiko, Gregory Jackson, and Hideaki Miyajima, editors, Corporate Governance in Japan: Institutional Change and Organizational Diversity. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Mid-term essay due on March 17, 5PM
Week 9 (March 20)
Spring recess
Week 10 (March 27)Laborissues in Chinese state capitalism
Chapter 12 inICER.
Ching Kwan Lee. Against the Law: Labor Protests in China's Rustbelt and Sunbelt. University of California Press.Chapters 3 and 5.
Charles Duhigg and David Barboza. 2012. “In China, Human Costs Are Built Into an iPad.” New York Times, January 25.
*Supplementary reading:
Barry Naughton. 1995. Growingout of the Plan: ChineseEconomicReform, 1978-1993. Chapter 6. Cambridge University Press.
Week 11 (April 3) Labor in Global India
Chapter 13 in ICER.
AseemShrivastava and Ashishi Kothari. 2013. Churning the Earth: The Making of Global India.Penguin Global. Chapters 1 and 2. Pp.10-77.
Week 12 (April 10)Capitalist class in global economy
Robert Perrucci and Earl Wysong. 2003. "Global Economy and Privileged Class," in The New Class Society: Goodbye American Dream? Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Pp. 91-118.
Louis Uchitelle and N.R. Kleinfield. 1996. "The Price of Jobs Lost." in The Downsizing of America, New York Times Books. Pp. 3-36.
Bastiaan van Apeldoom and Naná de Graaff and HenkOverbeek. 2014. “The Reconfiguration of the Global State-Capital Nexus,” in The State-Capital Nexus in the Global Crisis: Rebound of the Capitalist State. Chapter 2. Pp. 5-20.
Week 13 (April 17) Future trends in the employment
Walter W. Powell. 2009. “The Capitalist Firm in the Twenty-First Century: Emerging Patterns in Western Enterprise,” in The Twenty-First-Century Firm: Changing Economic Organization in International Perspective. Princeton University Press. Chapter 2. Pp. 33-68.
Vicki Smith. 2006. “Structural Unemployment and the Reconstruction of the Self in the Turbulent Economy” in Working in America: Continuity, Conflict, and Change. Chapter 10. (Excerpted from Vicki Smith. 2001. Crossing the Great Divide: Worker Risk and Opportunity in the New Economy. Ithaca: Cornell University/ILR Press.)
**One-on-one consultation
Week 14 (April 24) Varieties of Liberalization
Kathleen Thelen. 2014. Varieties of Liberalization and the New Politics of Social Solidarity. Chapters 1 and 2.
**One-on-one consultation
Week 15 (May 1)
Student presentations
Final paper due on May 5, 5PM
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